When Colby and I met, I lived in Cedar City, UT and he lived in Lehi, UT, a distance of 224 miles. However, soon after we started dating, he moved to St. George in order to decrease the L part of LDR. Honestly, it hasn't been too bad. During the summer we hung out all the time, and once school started for me we continued to see each other every weekend, switching off between St. George and Cedar. It also helps that we both work at the same place and get to see each other for like, 10 minutes every Tuesday and Thursday. It's even kind of fun getting to Skype on weeknights and sometimes communicate solely through Snapchat.
Since getting engaged, though, the distance has become much more of a nuisance. According to Wikipedia (don't ask me why I researched this), some of the most prominent difficulties for LDR couples include: increased financial burdens to maintain relationship, difficultly maintaining geographically close relationships, difficulty judging the state of the relationship from a distance, and high expectations from both partners for the quality of time they spend together.
I don't think Colby and I have much trouble with the last two seeing as how we're getting married, but I do know my gas expenses are through the roof. Also I'm currently writing this at like 10 pm on a Wednesday alone in my dark bedroom so it might be safe to say I don't have many "geographically close" interactions. But that's not really the point. The point of this post was for me to complain about being in an LDR while being engaged.
Cons:
• I want to be with Colby all the time and I can't.
• Texting, Snapchatting, and Skyping are just not the same as being face-to-face, no matter how fun the advertisements for Google Hangouts make it look.
• Wedding planning is just that more complicated and stressful.
• During the week I have nothing to distract me from doing homework other than daydreaming about the upcoming weekend.
• If a weekend happens when one of us is busy and can't go see the other, it's pretty much the worst thing that can happen.
• Constantly weighing the pros and cons of driving to St. George and back on a Wednesday night.
• Gas prices are literally my biggest enemy.
• Not having someone to cuddle with while I watch Netflix and eat Oreos.
I know what you're thinking. "I can't believe Shannon is complaining about her love life when she is engaged and almost married. It must be So Hard." (Capital S and H for sarcastic effect.) You're right. My life is actually pretty good. Which is why I also have a Pros section about being in an LDR while engaged.
Pros:
• Getting to spend all of every weekend with my favorite person in the world.
• Never having to make Friday night plans.
• Having a good reason to spend 10 days in St. George for spring break and just go hiking the whole time.
• Going on trips to Salt Lake for wedding planning and engagement pictures.
• Finding reasons to stay on Skype way after we should have gone to bed even though we aren't even talking about anything.
• Getting way too excited when Colby got a new phone because we can now send emojis and his camera is way better. Aka our text and Snapchat game went up to the next level.
• Going on trips to Flagstaff and LA to try to plan our future... which deserves a whole separate blog post.
• Knowing that we are both going through the same things and that we are there to support each other through it all.
I know what you're thinking this time too. "Awwww. Shannon really turned this one around." I didn't, though, really. Life is full of lots of pros and cons which is what makes it so flawed and perfect at the same time. I know I'll find the strength to survive through the last nine weeks of being in an LDR until I finally make it the amazing day where 54.9 miles turns into zero.
